Earning $60,000 a year without a four-year college degree sounds good but good relative to what? Flipping burgers pays worse than driving trucks or repairing power lines but doesn’t involve the same risks. Nationally, truck driving, garbage collecting, power line work and construction all ranked among the occupations with the highest fatality rates for 2005, the most recent year for which statistics are available.

Florida Workplace Fatalities
By Cause
Transportation	186
Falls	72
Harmful substances / environment	50
Violence / assault	47
Contact with objects / equipment	39
Fires / explosions	8
Other	2
Total	404
By Occupation
Construction	109
Wholesale and retail trade	49
Transportation and warehousing	47
Government	27*
Agriculture / Forestry / Fishing	20
Manufacturing	16
Leisure and hospitality	13
Education and health	11
*Six of the 27 were attributed to violence/assault, 12 to transportation incidents. Retail trade topped all categories with 16 fatalities attributed to violence. Note: Total does not add up to 404 because occupations with fewer than 11 deaths were not included.